


Notre Vie en rose

by RogueTranslator



Category: Hollyoaks
Genre: Angst, Dublin (City), Fade to Black, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, McDean, Post-Canon, Protective Craig, Romance, Sex, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21752515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RogueTranslator/pseuds/RogueTranslator
Summary: At the beginning of their life together, Craig surprises John Paul with a romantic dinner.This takes place in October 2008, shortly after Craig and John Paul arrive in Dublin.
Relationships: Craig Dean/John Paul McQueen
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	Notre Vie en rose

In his first year at Trinity, Craig had never had trouble focusing on his coursework. Considering how much of his mental energy was being expended on pining for John Paul back then, it had actually been a remarkable feat for him to direct all of his agony, his nervous mania, into the junior fresh Business modules. It was different now that they were finally together. Craig found his thoughts wandering to John Paul throughout the day—as they were now, in the stale air of a ground floor classroom, whilst the tutor dithered over letting them out early.

“Well.” Craig sprang up from his seat as soon as the class was dismissed. “Time to repair to my hovel.” On Fridays, he had lectures for Organisational Behaviour and Introduction to Finance in the morning, then a tutorial for Algorithms and Data Structures right after lunch. That meant that there was technically nothing stopping him from heading home for the day in the early afternoon.

Ramona continued typing out the proof on the white board and snorted. “Jacking it in already? It’s only the beginning of October, Craig.”

“Funny,” Craig said, sliding his laptop into his courier bag.

“I wasn’t kidding. You’re really missing our group study only two weeks into the term? It’s not like we’re doing some joke course like English or theatre.”

“I can miss one, can’t I?” Craig heaved his bag to his shoulder and snapped it shut. “Besides, whose brilliant idea was it to meet on Friday afternoons?”

Ramona looked up at him slyly. “Have something better to do, I’m guessing?”

“I have, actually,” Craig said, putting his hands on his hips. “I’m going to surprise John Paul with a special dinner. Had the idea just now. Candles, pink roses, the lot.”

“Well look at you, all puffed up with pride.” She shut her laptop and pushed out her chair. “I swear, everyone came back from summer loved-up but me. Makes me sick.”

“You should give it a try,” Craig said, as they walked to the door of the tutorial room.

“I think you’re obnoxiously happy enough for the both of us, don’t you?” She adjusted the straps of her backpack. “Besides, Craig, the modules in year two aren’t walkovers like the ones in junior fresh. I don’t have time for a bloke, even if I wanted one.”

Craig put on his shades as they walked out of the building and into the afternoon sun. “I get that. But John Paul and I—we’ve hardly had a moment to slow down since we got here, you know? We only landed a couple days before the start of term, so there wasn’t any time to just relax and show him around the city. Not to mention, we’re both busy during the week: he’s applying to clubs, I’m at uni all day—” Craig raised one hand in a gesture of frustration, then the other.

“And you want some time for the two of you,” Ramona finished. “Go on then, have your special dinner with your boyfriend. I’ll email you my notes.”

Craig leaned over and hugged her with one arm. “You’re a star, Mona.”

“What can I say? I’m a sucker for love.” She stopped walking where the footpath branched off to Nassau Street and laughed at Craig when he spun around and pointed both index fingers at her. “Other people’s love, that is. Much easier to live vicariously.”

“See you Monday!” Craig called, walking backwards. She disappeared into the campus’s on-the-hour horde, and he turned back to the road, trying to remember all the ingredients in the recipe he’d looked up whilst the tutor had been talking.

* * *

_Ur out tonight, right?_

“You alright, love? You look run off your feet.”

Craig looked up from his mobile. “Oh, yeah, I’m okay.”

The cashier nodded and input the code for broccoli.

“I’m just making a special dinner for my partner tonight,” he continued. “I’m not a very good cook, so—” He laughed and sent the text.

She smiled and scanned the flowers and bottle of rosé. “You don’t say.”

“It’s this dish I had all the time in Thailand. Took me a while to find the ingredients. I was at another shop before this—" Craig rubbed his neck. “Sorry, I’m rambling.”

She laughed and rang up the total. After he’d paid, Craig sat down on a seat near the door to check the buzzing in his pocket.

_Ya, have fun with JP :p_

He grinned and texted his other housemate. Unlike Craig, neither of them missed a chance to go out on the lash on a Friday, so he was optimistic. Besides, after three months away, he figured he was entitled to have a few nights of the house to himself.

 _Sure thing, good luck mate ;),_ came the reply, when he was halfway home. He stopped in the middle of the broad pavement in front of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and took a deep breath. A flock of pigeons at the steps to the churchyard scattered as a cyclist threaded the needle between Craig and the iron railing. For a few seconds, Craig felt overwhelmed by the turnaround in his life in just a few weeks. Only a little more than a month before, he’d been on a sunny, isolated, mosquito-infested beach in Thailand, seriously contemplating cutting all his ties, jacking in Trinity, living as a vagrant in the hills of Southeast Asia. That was the point to which his misery at John Paul’s absence had taken him.

Happily, he’d chosen to fight.

Craig opened his eyes and glanced up at the church’s steeple; the sun glinted intermittently off the cross at its zenith. The two of them hadn’t really talked about Kieron since leaving England. Craig wasn’t sure what to say, and he felt guilty for sometimes being glad for how little time and space in the last two weeks they’d had to just sit and talk. He knew John Paul still thought about Kieron—when he gazed off at nothing whilst they were having breakfast together; when he edged away from Craig in their bed late into the night, only to roll back a few minutes later and clutch him so tightly that it was painful. Craig would stroke John Paul’s back until one of them drifted off. Their housemates were wearing out the jokes about the two of them looking sleep-deprived, but Craig still smiled and wiggled his eyebrows in response. They didn’t need to know the truth.

Craig worried about him the most when he was at uni. He didn’t like that John Paul was alone all day, either with his thoughts or running away from them, dashing from venue to venue to inquire or audition or play a last-minute cancellation. Hopefully, John Paul would be able to transfer courses soon, and they could walk to campus in the mornings, study together at the library, walk home for dinner at night. After everything that had happened, Craig didn’t want to let John Paul out of his sight.

Craig looked down at his wrist. _4:15._ He had to get home, tidy up, and start cooking: he wanted the flat to look less like a sty by the time John Paul got back from his gig. The housemates had really gotten lax about cleaning in the time he’d been away. With a deep breath, he heaved himself away from the iron railing. At his approach, the birds in the churchyard flew away again, up to the roof of the tower and the sky beyond it.

* * *

_Gig done. On my way home. X_

Craig smiled down at his phone. He let go of the handle of the hoover and kicked it off.

_How’d it go? Xx_

_Great! I can tell you about it when you get home._

He returned the hoover to the hallway closet and surveyed the flat. The lounge looked at least passable, now that Craig had hauled the stack of empty pizza boxes to the recycling bin outside, cleared the used cups and empty cans from the coffee table, and pulled the curtains away from the sliding glass door to let in the sunset. The kitchen was properly clean now—his mother would probably disagree, but he’d washed up all the dirty dishes that had been stacked in the sink and scrubbed the worktop, which wasn’t bad for only having had an hour. Finally, Craig’s eyes settled on the dining room. He’d laid down a fresh, sky-blue tablecloth—the flat finally had more than one, after a year—and lit the tea candles he’d just purchased. The pastel pink roses from the same shop leaned against the side of their flat’s only vase, which was too wide to hold vertical the meagre number of stems Craig could afford on a student’s budget. At the edge of the table, Craig had stuck the bottle of rosé into a medium saucepan filled with ice cubes. They didn’t have a wine cooler.

Craig put his hands on his hips and grinned, thinking all of it beautiful.

In the kitchen, he opened his laptop and brought up the recipe he’d found earlier, then washed his hands and began cooking. He poured the water he’d boiled in the kettle over the noodles, rinsed and chopped the broccoli, cracked and whisked two eggs, crushed the garlic and added it to the oil in the frying pan. He’d started measuring and mixing the sauce when he heard the scraping of the front door. Craig wiped his hands on a dishcloth and turned to the mouth of the hallway, his chest tight and weightless with nervous energy.

“Oh, ho, what’s all this?” John Paul walked into the kitchen, glancing back and forth between Craig, the worktop, the dining table, the glow of the dying sun over the pizza box-less living room. “Have I walked into the wrong flat?”

Craig snorted and held out his arms. John Paul dropped his backpack to the floor and walked to him.

“Hello,” Craig said, after they’d kissed.

“Hello.”

“You taste of candy.”

“That’s a new line.” John Paul settled his hands at the small of Craig’s back and rubbed his nose into his.

“No, you literally do.”

“Ah.” John Paul leaned back and glanced at his bag. “Oh right, they were handing it out for free at the club sign-ups. I forgot I’d had some, actually.”

“How’d it go, then?”

“Alright, yeah. It was good to be back on the decks, even if it was only for a short shift between four other DJs. At a college gym. In the middle of the day. Without most of my records. Uh, is that burning?”

“Oh!” Craig spun around and darted to the hob, where the garlic had turned golden and crispy. “No, it’s fine.”

“What’s going on here, anyway? I thought you had your study group until half six.”

“I gave it a miss.” Craig turned off the flame and walked back to John Paul. “I wanted to make us a special dinner.”

“Well, this is definitely—special,” John Paul replied, his eyes crinkling with amusement.

“I’m being serious,” Craig said, squeezing John Paul’s arm. “Look, I know it’s been a bit mad since we got here—”

“Craig—”

“Just let me finish. We haven’t had any time to slow down and relax yet, have we? I’m stuck at uni from morning till night, you’re hustling for work—”

“Well, it’s not quite that bad yet, but in a few weeks’ time, who knows?”

“You know what I mean,” Craig said, exhaling.

John Paul blinked. “There’s nothing wrong, is there?”

“No.” Craig’s arm slid away as John Paul stepped back from him. “No, nothing’s wrong.”

“It’s just—” John Paul motioned with his hand, his brow knotting with worry. “All this. And you saying you want to talk.”

“I never said that,” Craig said, softly, patiently. “I said I wanted to make us a nice meal. Spend the night in together. Relax. Like a proper couple.”

“Oh. Right.” John Paul smiled and scratched his head. “Right. Us, a proper couple!”

Craig tipped forward and embraced him. John Paul cupped his head with his right hand, encircled his waist with his left arm, and Craig shut his eyes. This was where he belonged.

“It’s wild, isn’t it?” Craig rubbed his cheek into John Paul’s neck. “After two long years.”

“Although, one thing I’ve noticed,” John Paul said, a note of amusement creeping back into his voice. “You’re thinner now than you were when you went away.” His fingers tickled Craig’s ribs.

Craig laughed and pushed him off. “That’s backpacking across South and Southeast Asia for you. Lots and lots of walking, and the occasional bout of diarrhoea.”

“Lovely,” John Paul said, wrinkling his nose. “On that note, what’s for tea?”

“Oh. It’s these noodles I had all the time in Thailand. I wanted to try making them for you.” Craig turned the hob on again and looked around at the assembled ingredients.

“It smells good.”

Craig smiled at him over his shoulder.

“Do you need help with anything? Otherwise, I might go unpack my bag quickly.”

“No, no; it’s all in hand.” Craig peered at the screen of his laptop. “Go for it.”

“Won’t be a sec.” John Paul picked up his backpack, kissed Craig on the cheek, and disappeared down the hallway to their bedroom.

“Add broccoli stems, then florets,” Craig mumbled. He tipped the cutting board and stirred the pan as it popped and sputtered. His mind wandered as he stared down at the slow circles of the wooden spoon: he thought about the study group that was still going on in the arts block; his flight from Kathmandu to Bangkok, where he’d curled towards the window so that the person next to him wouldn’t see him crying over John Paul; his father mixing the mince into a pot of Bolognese sauce ten years ago, when Craig had been only just tall enough to see the top of the cooker. The pressure of John Paul’s arms around his chest bore him back from his reverie.

“How’s my sexy cook doing? Nigella isn’t a patch on you.”

Craig laughed and stroked his free hand over John Paul’s forearm. “You haven’t even tasted it yet.”

“Haven’t I?” John Paul murmured, settling his hips into Craig’s.

“You’re distracting me.”

“That was the idea, yeah.”

“There’s the entire rest of the night for that. How about you pour us some wine and let me focus on not burning our food?”

John Paul released him and walked to the dining table. “The entire night, eh? Someone’s sure of themselves.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I’d rather catch up on my sleep, on second thoughts.”

They exchanged a smirk. John Paul bent down to sniff the roses in their too-large vase.

“Do you like them?”

“They’re beautiful, Craig.” John Paul dipped his hands into his jeans pockets and looked down at the tea lights. “You didn’t have to push the boat out, though.”

“No, don’t be soft.” Craig added the rest of the broccoli and the eggs to the pan. “It’s just a little spur of the moment thing I thought up in tutorial. That’s why I didn’t tell you about it.”

John Paul shrugged and walked to the end of the table. “It’s more fun as a surprise, anyway.”

“Well, you always did like surprises. The good kind, at least.”

“What’s this, pink roses _and_ pink wine?” John Paul held up the bottle and quirked an eyebrow. “Not overcompensating for something, are you?”

Craig glanced at the recipe again and blew a raspberry. “Shut up. I just read that rosé goes with Thai food, that’s all.”

“I’ll defer to your judgement,” John Paul said, returning the wine to the ice-filled saucepan. “You’re the one who lived in a pub.”

“How about you pour me a glass, and I’ll tell you if I feel fully converted to the gay team?” Craig said, deciding to banter back.

“So, you’re saying one bottle of pink might manage to do what I haven’t? Cheers.” John Paul lifted the saucepan by the handle and walked to the cabinet with the wine glasses. They traded a laugh back and forth when he patted Craig’s backside on the way. “Seriously, Craig, I’m floored. It’s proper romantic, this.”

“Don’t tell me you’re surprised I have a romantic side.” Craig started the noodles and sauce on a separate ring and followed John Paul to the corner of the kitchen. “I flew halfway across the world to take you away with me, didn’t I?”

“Fair point.”

Craig watched him as he brought two wine glasses from the top shelf and carefully placed them beside each other.

“Did you—”

“What?”

“Never mind.” John Paul finished pouring one glass, moved on to the other.

“Come on, John Paul.”

“Did you do this sort of stuff for Sarah?” John Paul inserted the wine stopper, turned around, leaned into the worktop.

Craig shrugged. “I made romantic gestures now and again, sure. We were a couple for a long time.”

“Yeah.” John Paul handed him a glass and sighed. “Yeah, you were.”

“But—” Craig held out his glass for the toast. “I never loved her as much as I love you.”

John Paul’s gaze was unblinking. They stared silently into each other’s eyes as the noodles sizzled.

“To nice surprises,” John Paul said at last, clinking his glass into Craig’s.

Craig winked. “To the Cs I got two years ago.” He sipped and raised his eyebrows at John Paul, then turned around to switch off the hob.

“It’s nice. Not too sweet.”

“Yeah.” Craig set his glass down and tilted the skillet from side to side, coating the noodles in the thick black sauce.

“So, still straight?”

Craig pivoted back to him and laughed. “You’ll never let me forget that, will you?”

John Paul shrugged. His eyes twinkled impishly in the day’s last rays of light.

“It’s ready, by the way. We can dish up whenever.”

“I’m hungry now. You?” John Paul picked up the wine bottle and walked to the dining room.

“Yeah.” Craig spooned the contents of the other pan into the noodles and brought them to the table. “I hope it’s good; I had to make a few changes because the shops didn’t have all the ingredients I needed.”

“It smells amazing,” John Paul said, flopping into his chair. “I could get used to this, you know. Coming home to dinner already made.”

Craig grinned as he spooned some of the noodles onto John Paul’s plate. “You know something? So could I.”

“How could I compete with this, though?” John Paul lifted his plate, shut his eyes, and sniffed in the aroma. “This is like, fine dining.”

“Actually, it’s street food,” Craig said, taking a seat across from John Paul. “I had it almost every day when I was in Thailand.”

“My boyfriend, the globetrotter.” John Paul pointed his fork at Craig’s hand. “You’re even using chopsticks, you poncey git.”

Craig pushed John Paul’s fork away with his chopsticks. “Bon appétit, darling.”

It wasn’t bad, Craig thought, even though he hadn’t been able to find Chinese broccoli and had purchased—based on the thin and too-salty flavour—the wrong type of soy sauce. John Paul didn’t seem to notice: he was eating voraciously.

“What do you think?”

“I really like it, mate. Wouldn’t mind having this again.”

Craig smiled. “We can stick it in our rotation.”

John Paul twirled his fork into the noodles. “How was uni today? I forgot to ask earlier.”

Craig swallowed down a bite and nodded. “Good, yeah. Oh, at my lectures in the morning, the professors put the real-time global markets up on one of the big screens. One of them was white as a sheet; the other seemed almost excited—you know how professors get sometimes.”

“Does it feel weird to be studying business right now, when—” John Paul motioned with his wrist.

“When the world economy’s imploding? A little bit, yeah.”

“It’s mad, isn’t it? I mean, I barely understand what’s going on when I see it on the news, but it seems like each day there’s something worse.”

“You’re not far off.” Craig swirled the wine around in his glass and took a long gulp. “I only hope the worst of it’s over with by the time we’re done with uni.”

“ _If_ I get accepted.”

“You will.”

“Although, if I get knocked back, I can always try DJing full time. I’ve got talent, experience—and no matter how bad the economy gets, people still want a night out, don’t they?”

Craig chewed and nodded. “People might even need more of those the worse it gets.”

“See? Job security.” John Paul poured both of them more rosé. “Who says you’re the only one with business acumen in this relationship?”

“Anyone who says that has never seen what happens when you wave a tenner in front of a McQueen.”

John Paul kicked his foot under the table; Craig grinned at him angelically.

“More?” Craig said, lifting the skillet. He scraped the remaining noodles onto their plates.

A caesura fell over the conversation as they ate. The flat was dark except for the candlelight now, and Craig wasn’t sure whether that evoked more romance or melancholy. All the same, he felt stuck to his seat, watching as John Paul ate his last few bites. The light switch seemed unfathomably harsh and far away.

“I still can’t believe it,” Craig said. His voice was halting, unsteady.

“Eh?”

“That you’re here.” Craig rested his ankle on John Paul’s. “That you’re mine again.”

John Paul lay his fork on the empty plate and dabbed his mouth. “We’re meant to be, aren’t we? I think, after everything we’ve been through to get here, well, that much is clear.”

John Paul poured out the final drops of wine, filling Craig’s glass higher than his own. He set the empty bottle down next to the vase and stared into the flickering flame of one of the tea candles. By now they had all almost completely burnt out.

“You can talk to me about him, you know,” Craig said, after he’d watched the light waver in John Paul’s eyes for a while.

“I know.”

Craig hesitated, then crept his arm across the tablecloth and placed his hand over John Paul’s. John Paul glanced up and smiled faintly.

“I never met him, but—” Craig paused, treading carefully. “I’m grateful to him.”

John Paul blinked. “Eh?”

“For giving you what I couldn’t back then. Like you said, you deserved someone who was as proud to be with you as you were to be with him. You deserved more than—”

“Craig, please.” John Paul jerked his hand away; the table shook as he slid his chair back. The pink roses swayed over the sudden turbulence.

“I’m sorry,” Craig said, after a while. “I only want to help.”

John Paul nodded and rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes. “I know.”

One of the tea lights quavered, smoked, and went dark. They both glanced down at it.

“I’ll do the washing up,” John Paul said. He stood and picked up his plate.

“I’ll help you.”

“No, don’t be daft. You already did all this.” John Paul swept his hand from the dining table to the kitchen.

“Right.” Craig pursed his lips. “Well, I’ll just get ready for bed, shall I?”

“Craig.” John Paul set his plate at the corner of the table and walked over to him. Craig glanced up and blinked as John Paul stroked his hair. “Thanks for tonight. It’s amazing. Magical.”

Craig canted his head sceptically. “That’s going a bit far, isn’t it? It’s not like I’m whisking you away to Paris for the weekend or some—"

John Paul bent in and silenced him with a kiss that was heady with wine, with the anguish of the past, with the sublime beauty of the future. Craig reached up to wipe the tears along John Paul’s jawline.

“You noddy,” John Paul said, his lips hot at the corner of Craig’s mouth. “Just take a compliment already.”

“Hey, that’s my word.”

John Paul pulled him up and smacked his bum. “Go on, leave the washing up to me.”

Craig kissed his cheek. “See you in a bit.” He walked through the kitchen and paused to observe the city lights that sparkled below their balcony. When John Paul started blowing out the candles, he swallowed and continued on.

* * *

Craig looked up from his laptop as John Paul leaned into the doorway. The stark cone of light cast by his desk’s architect lamp illuminated the vase of roses in John Paul’s hands and left most of the rest of him in darkness.

“Oh, are you studying?”

“No, no.” Craig rubbed his eyes. “Just checking my emails before bed. Why do you have those?”

“I thought they’d be nice in here.” John Paul walked the roses to their chest of drawers and placed them between two picture frames, near the centre. Craig got up and stood next to him.

“Yeah, they look nice there.”

“This is my favourite one of us.” John Paul thumbed the edge of a photograph from their school days.

“Back when we were ‘just friends?’”

“We _were_ just friends back then. You had no idea what was about to hit you, mate.”

Craig laughed and curled his arm around John Paul’s waist.

“Neither did I, come to think of it. I probably didn’t even realise I fancied you yet.”

“Yeah, but I bet I intrigued you from the start, right?”

John Paul snorted. “The opposite, mate. I’m pretty sure I was taking pity on you for the first few weeks.”

“Okay, alright,” Craig said, pinching John Paul’s hip. “No need for that level of honesty.”

“I’m only messing.” John Paul smiled and touched his nose to the top of Craig’s ear. “What about you?”

“Oh, you know, you were this mysterious, tall, athletic, dead confident stranger. I had no idea why you were interested in being friends with someone like me, to be honest.”

John Paul hummed in approval. “Go on.”

“On the other hand, you were younger than me—that’s strike one—and a McQueen—that’s strike two—but I couldn’t exactly be choosy when it came to mates back then.”

“Or now, with that attitude,” John Paul muttered.

Craig grinned over his shoulder at the bed. “You tired yet?”

“I just need to brush my teeth.”

John Paul slipped out of his arm and into the hallway. When Craig heard the bathroom door shut, he walked to the window and cracked it open, letting in the cool autumn air and the muffled, discontinuous hum of night traffic on the R137. He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled off his jeans and socks, then lifted the covers and crawled into bed.

Craig glanced up from his phone when John Paul closed the door behind him. “Mum says she wants to visit us soon.”

John Paul snorted. “Wants to make sure I haven’t turned you into a mincing queen, more like.”

“She’s getting better.” Craig plugged his phone into its charger. “And I know she’s ridiculous, but you’ll have to put up with each other somehow. She’s my mum.”

John Paul stripped down to his boxers and tossed his jeans and T-shirt onto the overflowing laundry basket at the corner of their closet. “I’ll do our washing tomorrow.”

“I can help.”

“No, focus on your study. I haven’t got anything planned, anyway.”

Craig smiled at him and beckoned. John Paul placed his watch on his bedside table and slid in under the duvet.

“I had this daydream in one of my lectures this morning.” Craig rolled onto his side, propped up his head with one of his hands, caressed John Paul’s bicep with the other. “It got me a little flustered; I think the professor noticed, because she called on me for an answer.”

John Paul sighed. “Whatever will we do with the youth of today?”

“The thing is, since we got back together, we’ve only been doing things one way.”

John Paul snaked his hand to the curve of Craig’s arse and squeezed. “And you’re as talented as ever.”

“Yeah, but see, in my daydream, I was giving you a taste of your own medicine. And you were loving it.” Craig kissed the centre of John Paul’s chest. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed how much thicker you’ve got in the past year.”

“Seems like you just want to do all the work tonight,” John Paul said softly. He opened his legs as Craig slithered under the sheets and reemerged above him.

“I don’t know about that.” Craig yanked open the top drawer of the bedside table and fumbled around. “In my fantasy, you were putting in at least as much effort as me. Even looked like you were struggling a bit.”

“We’ll see,” John Paul said with a giggle, and Craig flicked off the lamp.

* * *

“I can’t lose you.”

John Paul murmured this into the bare skin of Craig’s chest: his throat vibrated beside Craig’s heart; his breath warmed the small patch of hair that tufted along Craig’s breastbone. At first, Craig’s dreamy mind incorporated John Paul’s voice into its incoherences—the unanswerable questions and insatiate desires that frolic in the liminal period between wakefulness and slumber—and he said nothing, just grunted and twitched his fingers enough to acknowledge the breaking of a silence.

“Craig?”

He blinked in the darkness. The fog over his mind was dissolving; the contours of the room, of John Paul’s body alongside his, were reasserting themselves. Through the crack in their window, the wind licked in, damp and cool.

“You won’t, darling.” Craig cleared his throat and twisted his neck to look at the top of John Paul’s head. “You won’t lose me.” His voice was hoarse with encroaching sleep and the lingering afterglow of wine.

“Craig—"

Craig felt the hot splash of tears just above his nipple. John Paul sniffed and started to roll away.

“Hey.” He rolled onto his side to match John Paul’s movement.

John Paul sobbed. “Craig, I love you too much. I’d rather die than—"

“Is it—” Craig wrapped his arms around John Paul and pulled him into him. “Kieron?”

John Paul took in a ragged breath in response.

“I’ll always be here, John Paul. No matter what.” John Paul’s back shook against his chest. “I promise you I’ll never leave.”

“What if something happens?”

“It won’t,” Craig said, with as much certitude as he could muster.

After a few minutes, John Paul sighed and flipped around to face him. He traced his fingertips from the back of Craig’s head, to the side of his neck, to the sharp line of his collarbone, before resting his palm over his heart.

“No matter what happens, how bad life gets—when I’m with you, it’s like the world becomes this beautiful place. Like I can do anything, like nothing can hurt me. The colours are richer, the music’s brighter—does any of this make sense?”

Craig lay on his back and pulled John Paul down with him. “It’s exactly how I feel.”

“Really?” John Paul slung his arm across Craig’s upper body; their hands met in the hollow of Craig’s waist. “Those exact words, huh?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of everything being pink and lovely and perfect.” Craig closed his eyes and smiled. “And gay. Can’t forget gay. Both meanings.”

John Paul’s breath tickled his chin. “You sure have a way with the English language.”

“I’ll give it another go at breakfast,” Craig mumbled. “Let’s sleep now.”

John Paul snorted and eased into his shoulder. Craig stroked his back until his muscles went slack and his breathing slowed to a steady, restful calm. After a few minutes, Craig opened his eyes and watched the peace on John Paul’s face, the rise and fall of his arm in time with Craig’s breathing. The night breeze billowed the curtains, letting in a cascade of moonlight that reached all the way to the roses on their chest of drawers. In the midnight gloom, they were indistinct, pale; then, with the settling of the drapes, lost to the shadows again. Craig gently kissed the top of John Paul’s head and thought about how beautiful they'd be when the sun rose in the morning.


End file.
